Former United States President Donald Trump and 18 of his allies were indicted in Georgio on Monday on charges of illegally overturning the election results of 2020.
Democrat leader Joe Biden was declared the winner of the elections in November 2020. But Trump claimed that the polls were not fair and that there was a conspiracy to stop him from winning another term.
Trump’s assertion led to his supporters storming the US Capitol building on January 6, 2021, to prevent Biden from being certified as the next president.
“Mr Trump and the other Defendants charged in this indictment refused to accept that Mr Trump lost, and they knowingly and willfully joined the conspiracy to unlawfully change the outcome of the election in favour of Mr Trump,” the indictment issued by the office of Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis, reported the Associated Press.
Among those indicted besides Trump are former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, Trump’s personal attorney Rudy Giuliani, former Justice Department official Jeffrey Clark and others.
This is the fourth criminal case against Trump and the second related to the election results of 2020. He was charged with attempting to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential elections by a court in Washington in August.
Prior to that, he has been charged with mishandling classified documents and in a criminal case related to making payments during his 2016 presidential campaign bid to silence an adult film actor.
On Monday, Willis said Trump and the other defendants would be allowed to voluntarily surrender by August 25.
She also said she will seek a trial date within six months, according to the Associated Press.
In a statement, Trump described the district attorney as a “rabid partisan” who had filed “bogus indictments” to interfere with the 2024 presidential race and “damage the dominant Trump campaign”.
“This latest coordinated strike by a biased prosecutor in an overwhelmingly Democrat jurisdiction not only betrays the trust of the American people but also exposes the true motivation driving their fabricated accusations,” said the statement.
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